gainful employment

In Brunei, there is a great deal of unemployment,Young graduates hang around the Malls, blonde streaks in their dark hair,tight jeans, and an aimless energy about them. They leave school at fifteen, try to find an odd job, lose interest and spend their days restless or strumming guitars outside their houses. Small groups huddled here and there. I often look at them and wonder what they have the potential to be. I know they have the potential to be great and i have to stop myself from going up to them and asking. Then there are the graduates, fresh out of University with that energy only a graduate has, ready to take on the world with their accumulated knowledge .The graduates favour working in a government job as their are a lot of benefits, housing allowance, education allowance and a pension scheme. And that, is seemingly the scope of their ambition. To get the benefits and thats it. Those immortal words by Kennedy come to mind " Ask not what your country can do for you , but what you can do for your country" ( Something like that, quotes are not my strong point)

I feel a tinge of hopelessness when the young are somewhat focused on merely garnering benefits.

Recommended By Colombia

Yes, its human nature to want financial security but to be conditioned to have a career purely for the allowance scheme and the pension is somewhat sad. I feel. With this in mind, i decided i wanted in a small way to help people find good and meaningful careers. I wanted them to have a sense of excitement and passion and to love what they do. To dream higher than a pension scheme and to dream big and to allow their ideas and talents to pour forth ... i get rather hyper when i think of possibilities. But still, i wanted to do something.

Thus, a few months ago, armed with nothing more than a really old laptop and an idea I started a voluntary " employment agency" which i have cleverly called " Brunei Employment Agency " as opposed to the great Temple of meaningful work .. which is a thought.

My intention being to help these young people find work, to develop their potential and to do something they can contribute to.. not just a job they do begrudgingly but something they can do well and still, hopefully make buckets of money .

I spend a lot of time reading many CV's and cover letters, and i always pay particular notice to the " Hobbies and Interests" section of these resumes , for therein i find lies a little key to the applicant. Inevitable the lady applying to be an administrative clerk has a passion for embroidery and creating web sites.. or the guy applying to be a Kitchen Helper loves sports and composing songs ... the young lady applying for ' any vacancy' with a masters in Malay literature and several published poems... These are stories i read most days.. and voices i hear talking to me from each and every piece of neatly typed , bold printed word .

Since then i have sat through many interviews and listened in a hazy blur as these wonderful and intelligent people describe their ' dream job' as being in a government position. I so yearned to hear someone say they wanted to be a trapeze artist, or an astronaut, a zoo keeper , the owner of a sweet shop that sold chocolate and candy floss, a Farmer, a tinker, a tailor... something

I want them to talk of their goals and ambitions , and how they wanted to make positive changes and help Brunei grow and flourish; To tell of their entreprenurial spirit or their determination to start of in a 'menial ' job so long as they got experience and work their way up. I want them to fly and be brave.

There is nothing sadder seeing potential go to waste and if we can, in any way contribute to inspiring and encouraging others then we should. I do not want to see them follow the motley throng because, somewhere along the way that is what they have been taught or told to do. It breeds an attitude of discontent and so often people end up in the wrong job, going through the daily motion and not gaining any satisfaction, but are scared or don't even know that they have a choice. I know it is important to make a living, but why not go one better and create a meaningful life? One that gives them the bliss of satisfaction at finding their calling.

I have thus decided to call it, not an ' employment' agency but perhaps an ' empowerment' agency. Hopefully the next person who walks through my door will, somewhere, inside them, have a dream they are willing to share and i do hope they want to be an Astronaut or open a doughnut shop... and maybe one day the young girl with that Masters in literature will actually have the courage to be the writer she obviously was born to be.